Don’t look back, many more cars beckon
ELKHART LAKE, WIS.—Keep moving, they say, and it’s usually good advice. Similarly, in the immortal words of former Major League pitcher LeRoy (Satchel) Paige, “Don’t look back, someone might be gaining on you.” Those thoughts crossed my mind as I waited in line in the pit lane of the 4-mile Road America race course. Could have been in a Mercedes CLS, or dozens of other new cars, or while plunging down the off-road trail in a Range Rover, or attacking the autocross in a Honda Civic Si sedan.
For auto journalists, who are always trying to gain on each other, the Midwest Auto Media Association is a very active and impressive group based in Chicago, but serving the whole Upper Midwest, from St. Louis, Des Moines, Indianapolis, Illinois, Wisconsin, and one outpost in Minnesota. As a group, it has considerable clout, but one of the things it does best is to have a good time. That’s one reason, undoubtedly, that the Chicago Auto Show is clearly the most pleasant and fun show in the country, if not the world.
And, of course, whoever made up the name knew exactly what was coming with the acronym “MAMA,” as in Mother Ship. One of the remarkable things MAMA pulls off every year is the Spring Collection, a well-sponsored gathering of its journalists at the Osthoff Resort in Elkhart Lake. We spend two days at the race track, pushing about 40 new vehicles through paces far beyond highway duties.
This Spring Collection, known by nickname and date as SC-07, might have been the best of all. Specially lined up were a dazzling new Audi R8 sports car, a Lamborghini, a Bentley Continental Biturbo sports car, and a new Dodge Viper. There also were a couple of restored, street-roddish 1965 Chevrolet Corvettes. We could drive anything else we wanted, but it took patience and waiting in long lines to drive one of those exotic beasts.
In the minds of some, I suppose I blew it, because I never got inside the Lamboghini, R8, Viper, Bentley, or the Corvettes. But allow me to explain the best possible rationalization. I was preregistered for a turn in the Lamborghini, which would have been at 10:20 a.m. on that Tuesday morning. But we all were scrambling to drive the other cars on the track as well, and after being one of the first in line, I took a couple of more hot rides. So there I was, in line, waiting as the starters kept a proper interval before allowing the next car onto the track. I was in a Cadillac STS-V, second in line, when my assigned time in the Lamborghini came…and went. I figured if I hurried, I might get back in time, so I hustled around on my lap, but the car was gone, driven by the next guy in line.
Oh well. We had the rest of that day, and the following day, so I assumed another chance would come around. I had gotten a taste of what was to come by driving a new BMW 760iL “Individual” from Minnesota to Elkhart Lake. It’s about a 5 1/2 hour drive to the course, which is located about an hour north of Milwaukee. The big BMW was, to put it mildly, the perfect road machine for the trip. Loaded with features and options that are mind-bending, the 760 has a V12 engine, with far more power than any normal driver could use in everyday driving, this side of an autobahn, at least. Still, keeping speeds moderate, and combining Interstates 94 and 90 with a lot of smaller rural highways, I averaged 20.8 miles per gallon going, and just under that coming back, when, as we all know, it’s more uphill.
Driving a new car on a normal highway test drive is educational, and after 35 years of it, I have a pretty fair routine down. But on a normal highway, you can’t speed or push the car hot through a turn, unless you have a season pass in the form of a get-out-of-jail-free card. On a race track, where reasonable speed is requested, you can push each car to its limits during one full lap, and get a feel for how the car — and the driver — might perform at extremes.
After our pre-track briefing on the first Tuesday in May, I was first out to the paddock area, choosing the twin-turbocharged BMW 335 coupe. It had rained the previous day and all through the night, and while it stopped in time for us, the track was definitely wet. Logic indicated extreme caution with the array of powerful street machines on the wet course. I took off onto the main straight, accelerating hard but braking early, in a straight line, before the sharp-right Turn 1. No problem, but Turn 1 is about the highest point of ground on the whole track, so I knew lower parts might be wet and more treacherous. Down the short hill for the slight kink and the hard right Turn 3, I tapped the brakes early again, and started to accelerate across the apex of the turn. The rear-drive 335 fishtailed once — just a little twitch, but enough to grab my attention — before my counter-steer and the car’s stability control system immediately straightened it out. Accelerating hard then, I hustled down the fastest part of the track, which concludes on a downhill plunge for the 90-degree left at Turn 6. Before I got hard on the brakes — and early — I noticed the speedometer had reached just past 130 miles per hour. It hauled down smartly, we went smoothly through the turn, and the rest of the lap was uneventful, but very impressive.
After one lap we learned that nobody would be able to run the shiny new Ford Shelby Mustang, because some bozo had overdone it. Incredibly, he overdid it on the first turn of his first lap, going off track, spinning out, and wrinkling the left side of the sleek coupe from nose to tail against a rather unforgiving guard rail.
Next I took out a red MazdaSpeed3. It was fast and strong, and with its turbo-boosted 4-cylinder and a stick shift, it ran the lap flawlessly. A Mini Cooper S, which I hadn’t driven before, also proved a lot of fun. BMW, which owns Mini, has redone the car with slight stretching of all dimensions from the previous model, and replacing the South American-built supercharged engine, a joint-venture with Chrysler, with a new 4-cylinder, turbocharged, and built jointly with Peugeot. The 6-speed stick worked well, but as fun as the car was, it seemed to me that I was mentally wrestling with whether to be revved too high in second or lugging a bit in third at a couple of the sharpest turns. Still, with front-wheel drive, the Mini flew around all 14 turns without a wiggle.
Two sporty luxury sedans with different approaches to the same objective both were outstanding on the track. The Acura TL Type-S, with sports suspension and a hotter engine, has enough punch and handling to prove conclusively that front-wheel drive and hot performance are NOT mutually exclusive. The Infiniti G35 comes in “X” form with all-wheel drive, but this was the “S,” a well-balanced rear-drive sedan with sporty upgrades. It also did very well around the track, although I was more cautious in the corners than with the TL, because the rear-drive still has a greater urge to swing the rear end out.
I then spotted a Cadillac official near a big Cadillac STS-V, with the supercharged NorthStar V8. I said I’d like to take it out, and he asked if he could ride along. Another journalist friend spotted me and jumped into the front passenger seat. So off we went, three aboard. Run hard, brake and turn right at 1, down the hill, brake hard again, then hit it for the hard right. The track was about an hour drier than when I drove my first lap, and since most drivers were in the proper line, the line was driest of all. But when I hit the STS-V, it veered pretty much sideways. If it was a fishtail, it was a large fish. But I caught it, and we straightened out immediately. The Cadillac official even complimented me on the save. Strong and fast the rest of the way around, but I wasn’t sure I trusted the Caddy’s Pirellis as much as some other tires on other cars.
The Volvo S80 continues to be one of my favorite real-world sedans, for its safety and sure-handling, as well as its great seats — and despite some strangely critical rips recently written about its “dullness” in Car and Driver. There was one with the new V8, but I chose another, with the 3.2-liter inline 6 and front-wheel drive instead of all-wheel drive. The S80 leaned a bit more in the sharpest curves than the all-out performance cars on hand, but it tracked predictably, smoothly, and securely all the way around. Volvo also had brought along the C70 retractable hardtop convertible. Top down, it felt good, but it is more of a smooth and enjoyable boulevardier than a race-track hustler — which also describes 95 percent of real-world drivers.
Another favorite is the Mitsubishi Lancer, with its stylish redesign. It is front-wheel drive, too, and it sailed around the track very well, even if I would like a dose more horsepower. The joint-venture world 4-cylinder with Chrysler and Hyundai seems strong and steady enough, but it wheezes a bit from shortness of breath when you really want to hammer it at mid-RPMs. What I don’t understand is that Mitsubishi will come out with its long-awaited Evolution X soon, and it will have Mitsubishi’s own 2.0-liter 4, with all-wheel drive and turbocharging, and it will stun the analysts. So why not take off the turbo, and the AWD, and give us what’s left of that mighty engine in the basic Lancer?
My Lamborghini chance was gone, and I kept glancing at the sweet new Audi R8 Porsche-challenger, but it was never sitting still when I was around. Same with the Bentley sports car, and the Cobra. So I kept going back out on the track, never missing a turn, There was still a lot of time after lunch, and there were so many great cars to drive. A sleek Jaguar XK coupe, for example, the stylish new version of the car that captured the world’s fancy as the XK-E some 40 years ago. An “R” supercharged version was there as well, but the normally-aspirated one was available when I walked up, and it was impressive enough, with class, grace and power.
I couldn’t resist jumping into an Acura MDX — a large SUV in which I had been dazzled during its introduction in a different rainstorm, and on a different race track, in Pennsylvania. Sure, the MDX was taller and less racy than the lower-slung cars, but it tracked just as I anticipated around every turn, with its SH-AWD sending enough torque from front to rear to push around curves without yielding that front-wheel-drive precision. Remember now, I remain in dispute with those hot-shoes who insist true performance can only be attained with rear-drive, and I never whine if there’s a little “torque steer” when a front-wheel driver is over-driven. It’s a signal that maybe I’m cornering a little too hot. Besides, in snow and ice, FWD wins and it’s no contest.
Among the neatest new 2007 models is the Suzuki SX4. It is a compact, or subcompact, a 4-door hatchback with a spunky little 2.0-liter 4, with all-wheel drive. It did well, without the higher-rev potency I’d have preferred, but its cornering stability was excellent.
The fellows from Mercedes had an interesting arsenal of cars, and a PR staffer rode with me on a lap in the CLS — the fantastic “4-door coupe” that looks as sleek as any coupe with its constantly sloping roofline. I had driven one on the autobahn in Germany, and its strong impression was reinforced around Road America, surging through the turns and running also right up to 130 on the main straight. Awesome. Then we took the new CL63 coupe, with an AMG V12 under the hood. It was, I was informed, for “Street” only. No problem. We left the track and hustled around the neatly winding roads of the Kettle Moraine country and came back, and all was beautiful.
Volkswagen’s redone Golf has a 5-cylinder engine, but the GTI gets the fantastic Audi 2.0-liter turbo 4, and a gleaming white model proved the GTI is now available as a 4-door. The 6-speed stick did its job well, although I knew I would meet that car again at autocross time.
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A Ford Fusion was there, the new AWD model. I had been impressed with it during a street preview, so running it around the track would be interesting, especially since it had a comparatively mild 3.0 V6 and no performance equipment. I was right. It handled well, and it went around all the turns smoothly, and as I came up the final hill toward the pit road, I caught a glance of the sticker placed on the upper corner of the far side of the windshield. It said “Street” as plain as day, which is different from “Track” in that it was one of the cars designated to be driven around the town’s rural roadways, but not on the track. I apologized to the Ford folks, but assured them the Fusion didn’t need such a restriction, because it handled every challenge with ease.
When we took a break for lunch, I made a note of which cars I most wanted to drive in the afternoon. No pressure, just fun. Then the word came that the on-track stuff was finished for the day. We now could go over to the infield go-kart track for a little mellow competition. Maybe tomorrow, I thought, I’d get my hands on those exotics.
On Wednesday, we gathered early and spent the first half of the morning on the very challenging off-road course designed by the Range Rover experts. That, too, was fascinating. The Range Rover, Range Rover Sport, and the new LR2 all did their jobs well, as anticipated. My first drive was in a Jeep Grand Cherokee with its new Mercedes diesel engine. The thing had amazing torque for churning up the steepest grades, and I think it may give the Cherokee a whole new outlook. On the steepest plunge of the course, following a blind turn that requires an expert spotter, I put it in low-range, low gear, with hill-descent control on. The tough part, the Range Rover guy said, is to take your foot off both the gas and brake and let the thing crawl down. Except the Cherokee surged the first 10 feet on the quite-vertical slope as if it was going to bury its grille nose-first into the ground below. I cheated and hit the brakes, after which the Cherokee crept down admirably.
The Cherokee and I gained points near the end of the toughest trek, where a Range Rover ahead of us had to back up and restart repeatedly before crawling up and over some severe boulders. I got a pretty good start, stayed left, and — using the old trick from climbing icy hills in Duluth — stayed on the power to keep momentum as it climbed right on up and over.
Most impressive though, was the surprisingly adept handling on the easiest of the three trails of the Kia Sportage, and the Suzuki Grand Vitara. The costlier, purpose-built off-roaders were very good, but these $20,000 vehicles designed primarily for on-road family use showed they could easily handle light off-roading. At one point, a fellow in a Range Rover overshot his turn and ended up coming down a steep hill and onto my lower trail, ahead of a Volvo XC90 and my Sportage. I watched as first the Range Rover, then the Volvo, strained to stay in the very muddy tracks, churning with their front wheels cocked and making it. I zipped through there, clicked into 4×4 lock, and made it, keeping the wheels straight and not even spinning.
Then we were whisked away, to run the autocross. A hastily arranged setup of cones outlined the tightly turning course in the paddock parking area. We went, one at a time, and tried to do our best in a one-lap timed run. My first turn was in an Audi TT 3.2 V6, and it felt great. I flew around the cones, hitting none, accelerated hard on the speed stretch, and used the quattro’s best all-wheel-drive bite in the tightest parts, and easily came to a complete stop in the finishing box. I later ran the GTI, Mini Cooper S., SX4, Lancer, and the new Civic Si 4-door sedan. The Si felt the hottest, but the officials said I missed one of the late gates, where many seemed to stay between cones but still overlook the tiniest of the cones here or there. So, I asked, what about my first lap, the near-perfect run in the TT? Oh, they said, that was the first turn of the day, and they missed it on the clock.
No matter. We had a great lunch, with bratwursts from the nearby Johnsonville Brat factory, and it was time to scatter for our departures. I climbed back into the BMW 760iL, and, after the Sirius satellite radio kept me going for half way, I plugged my iPod into the hidden jack in the console, and cruised the rest of the way into the late-afternoon sun, heading west on I94 and listening to my own array of Greg Brown, and various eclectic singer-songwriter types. It was a most successful couple of days. I don’t think anyone drove more laps than I got in, all in vehicles of my choice. I learned a lot about them, and about myself, too.
Then it hit me. I never did get into the R8! Or the Lamborghini, or Bentley Continental, or the Cobra. I was too busy, keeping moving, always moving. Do I still want to drive all those exotics? Definitely. Would I trade three or four of the others for one exotic? No. Driving 17 cars on the track, two more on the streets, five off-roaders, and six in the autocross…that’s 30 cars in two days. If I missed anything, I’m not about to look back now, even if nobody is gaining on me.
Lexus rides hybrid- V8 to super-luxury pedestal
PASADENA, CALIF. — When you first lay eyes on the new Lexus LS600h, it doesn’t look all that different from the beautiful new LS460 luxury sedan. Then in the chrome lower body molding, you see a little indentation where the word “Hybrid” is emblazoned in bright, environmentally friendly blue letters.
It signals that hybrid cars, which combine electric motors with a gasoline engine for increased power and fuel-efficiency, have come full circle, from lightweight gas mileage champs to wind the premier luxury car ever produced in Japan — or, perhaps, anywhere on the planet.
The “600” designation is aimed at Lexus target super-luxury vehicles, the top BMW 760L, Mercedes S600, and the Audi A8L, all with 6.0-liter V12 engines. The LS600 has a 5.0 V8 engine, but it is emboldened to the equivalent performance of 6 liters by the input of two electric motors in the hybrid system, with all-wheel drive. To pull off such a masterpiece satisfied the Lexus theory of combining performance and luxury at the highest levels, and adding a major dose of technology.
While the loaded Audi, at $119,000, is less expensive than the Mercedes and BMW flagships, the Lexus LS600h plans on undercutting them all at $104,000 — “not counting destination,” a Lexus official said, with a straight face. That puts the LS into a stratosphere, of both price and technical innovation, never before invaded by Lexus.
“Putting a V12 into this car would have been the easy way,” said Jim Farley, Lexus vice president and general manager, during the media introduction of the car at the Ritz-Carlton Huntington Resort. “But that wouldn’t have taken enough innovation.”
Eighteen years ago, Lexus opened for business with the LS400 as its top model, and it clearly was an attempt at stalking Mercedes. Over the years, Lexus built a solid reputation for luxury and quality. The all-new LS460 represents the first complete overhaul of the company’s top model, and Farley flatly states that the LS600h will be a limited-edition flagship, with only about 2,000 annual sales, which would be 5 percent of the hot-selling LS fleet.
It was time, however, for the car to step out from its perception as copier, and to do so, applying the company’s advanced probes in hybrid technology was a natural. “Over the past 17 years, we have some experience in whether to go our own way,” said Farley. “In 1997, Toyota came out with the first Prius hybrid, and 10 years later, we’ve come a long way. This is a separate and distinctive vehicle, with state-of-the-art technology, built by experienced master craftsmen.”
The LS600h starts with a high-tech 5.0-liter V8 with dual-overhead camshafts, 48 valves, with variable valve-timing and direct injection — a powerplant that produces 389 horsepower and 385 foot-pounds of torque, and obviously could have hustled the 5,049-pound vehicle right along. It is linked to a unique battery pack/electric motor arrangement designed in collaboration with Panasonic, using a 288-volt DC nickel-metal-hydride battery pack that dispenses the equivalent of 221 horsepower.
Combining the two systems runs a maximum of 438 combined horsepower through a mechanical transfer case, which distributes it through a Torsen differential to all four wheels. The basic split is 60-percent power to the rear, but road or driving conditions cause it to adjust.
The LS600h has a new system, called Lexus Synergy Drive, the latest plateau in combining gas-electric power. Hybrids still make the most practical sense, because the gas engine and braking energy recharge the battery packs, which either power or supplement propulsion of the car — free energy without plugging into your home electric meter. The first hybrids coupled with tiny engines for spectacular gas mileage of 70 or 55 miles per gallon in the Honda Insight or Toyota Prius, respectively. Playing with larger engines in larger cars proved surprising power could be made, as long as good — not great — gas mileage can be justified.
In the Toyota system, the gas engine serves as a generator, running to make and store electrical energy to power the electric motors — which, in turn, power the vehicle and its accessories. Honda’s system uses the gas engine as primary, with the electric power joining in for acceleration, although the Honda Civic will run at certain moderate speeds on electric alone. The Ford system can run all electric at low speed, all gas engine at high speed, but mostly a combination of the two.
I asked the Toyota engineers if there was ever a time when the LS600h could be propelled by the gasoline engine alone, and the answer is: No.
Clearly, the emphasis is on power and performance. The LS600h will go from 0-60 in 5.5 seconds, which is sports-car territory, and it will attain 130 miles per hour, but EPA estimated fuel economy is only 20 city, 22 highway. Lexus quickly points out that 21 combined is better than the target BMW, Mercedes or Audi models. I would settle for giving up two seconds of acceleration for 10 more mpg, and someday, maybe sooner than later, maybe we will get a dashboard knob to turn one way for power and the other for optimum mpg. But those spending over $100,000 for a car may be less interested in gas mileage.
The car my partner and I codrove was the Launch Edition, the long form of the LS, in a distinctive truffle mica color, with alabaster white leather interior, and black leather on the dashboard and on trim locations. Yes, amid recent criticisms of hard plastic or soft plastic or textured plastic for dashboard surfaces, Lexus stepped above and beyond to put the classiest, high-grade leather on the dash.
That is just one of numerous exhibits that prove Lexus’s attention to detail. Toyota developed the full-size Tundra pickup truck to standards above and beyond the normally accepted definition of a pickup, but that was nothing like this.
For example, the LS600h has a continuously-variable transmission, but not in the normal CVT sense of a long belt running around two size-adjusting pulleys. Toyota uses planetary gears in a super-smooth system in which the switching among eight gears is imperceptible. Unless, that is, you shift into a manual gate, from which you can select any of the eight gears manually.
Whether driving in automatic or the “S” sequential manual mode, the power is further filtered by a toggle switch that goes from snow, to hybrid, to power settings. Hybrid is for normally smooth driving; power makes the gas pedal response sharper; and snow causes a softer pedal response, easier for starting on slippery surfaces. You can also push an EV switch to engage full-electric drive mode for short-range, slow driving by using silent electric power only.
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Driving the LS400h shows that Lexus has not compromised on its highly regarded luxury, but instead has raised it, also. We sat in plush comfort, surrounded by wood and leather and polished metal, and we didn’t even bother to turn on the high-tech audio system. Big Al, my driving partner, virtually boasts about how conservative a driver he is, and he raved about he felt comfortable taking the sharpest mountain highway curves far faster than usual. I drove much more aggressively through those curves, causing Al to reach for his antacids, and the LS600h still stayed flat and stable in all circumstances. As usual, any changes in the hybrid use of gas-engine or electric-motor power is totally seamless.
The suspension, electronic power steering, and variable gear ratio steering all are computer-coordinated to supply optimum control, depending on road conditions and driving style. With VDIM — for vehicle dynamics integrated management — the system coordinates electronic antilock brakes, stability control, brake-force distribution, and throttle-controlled engine torque, by gathering information through all sorts of sensors. The stability control can be turned off, for those who might be tempted to fling the LS400h L into a hot-rod tail-wag. Seems to me they’d be more likely to sit in the right rear seat and take advantage of the reclining/massaging option.
Traditional Lexus safety also climbs to new levels. The standard eight airbags can be increased to 11 with the right options checked. The LS460’s ability to park itself is also available on the LS600h, and then some. An advanced pre-collision system can detect objects in the path of the LS600h, and is coupled to a driver monitor system. A camera mounted on the steering column monitors the driver’s face, and if it detects that the driver is not looking ahead for a few seconds, and an obstacle is detected, a warning chime, quickly followed by a flashing light, alerts the driver. If the driver is slow to respond, the system also starts to apply the brakes, reprograms the steering ratio for emergency action, and ultimately prepares the brakes for full-force usage, and partially tightens the seatbelts for possible impact.
We’re not quite ready for a car that totally drives itself, but the LS600h comes as close as we’re going to get for the near future.
Acadia opens GMC to world of crossover SUVs
By John Gilbert
Last Updated: Thursday, December 14th, 2006 01:30:25 AM
PALO ALTO, CA. — General Motors is rescuing itself from nose-diving market share by changing its manufacturing scope and switching over to high-tech engines, and is now even building trucks that arenÂ’t really trucks, in the traditional sense. The GMC Acadia launch in Palo Alto is the latest example.
General Motors vice president Bob Lutz arrived at the media launch of the Acadia just in time to capture the essence of what such a new vehicle can mean for the corporation. The Acadia is a breakthrough on several fronts. It is the first crossover SUV built by GMC, joining siblings-to-come such as the Buick Enclave, Saturn Outlook, and a Chevrolet to be named later. With lighter, safer, unibody construction attached to car-like, rather than a truck platform, the Acadia handles with impressive agility, particularly when compared to midsize GMC trucks like the Envoy or Yukon.
By not being full-size trucks, apparently they must be called crossovers. Or can we call them trucklets? Whatever, they are zooming past mid and full sized SUVs in sales for the first time ever, so the emergence of the Acadia shows GMÂ’s departure from its dedicated reliance on larger, once-profitable trucks and their revised but aging, pushrod engines.
“This is about as good as we know how to do it right now,†Lutz told the assembled auto writers. “We may know better five years from now, but right now, this is it. This is something new, a crossover SUV. The Acadia has a four-cam, aluminum V6 with a six-speed transmissionÂ… ItÂ’s a traditional design, with great proportions – muscular, stable, athletic, yet with beautiful lines, a unitized body, ultramodern design, car-like suspension systemÂ…itÂ’s aerodynamic, itÂ’s lighter, and it has similar or greater interior volume than an Envoy or Yukon. This is a ‘no excuseÂ’ vehicle, and itÂ’s a perfect fit for the GMC brand.Ââ€
LutzÂ’s candor is always refreshing, and he sliced past GM loyalists in their traditional posture of defending the low-tech-on-a-budget approach that GM rode to supremacy 30 and 40 years ago. Lutz simply acknowledges the importance of high-tech engines.
“The 3.6 multi-valve?†Lutz said, referring to the Acadia engine. “ThereÂ’s no limit to the power we can get out of it. Many of us felt that in this day of customers having increased technical knowledge, it helps our marketability to have an engine like this to compete against the great German and Japanese engines.Ââ€
The “high feature†3.6-liter V6, first designed for Cadillac, has dual overhead camshafts and four valves per cylinder, with variable valve-timing, and makes 275 horsepower in the Acadia. A six-speed automatic with either front-wheel or all-wheel drive. Traction control, and StabiliTrak further aid stability. It swept through a series of hairpin turns in the mountains, even with four on board, and there is room for a couple more in the third row seats. Three rows of seating for eight is a major selling point for the Acadia, and there is still storage room behind the fold-down third-row seats, which are surprisingly large and quite easy to access. Folding down rows two and three creates 117 cubic feet of storage.
The automatic transmission has a neat little “tap shift†button on the side of the shift knob for manual up and down shifts. That proved useful in hustling around the tightly twisting mountain roads, because you can drop down into third and be at the right spot in the power band for the curvy, hilly stuff. The little button is concave at the bottom, where you downshift, so you can do it without taking your eye off the road. I would prefer steering wheel mounted paddles, because then you could shift manually without taking one hand off the wheel.
Lutz discussed the importance of coordinating North American, European, Asian, and Brazilian production as a preferable way to cut costs.
“If you get yourself healthy by sacrificing future products, you could be out of business,†Lutz said. “You have to forge ahead and pour money into new products. You can’t save your way to prosperity. Revenue is the answer, which means making cars and trucks that people will be willing to part with their money for.
“The quality difference is so close now. Every new vehicle has the same quality, the same safety, and all have multi-cam aluminum engines. The difference is – does your vehicle make an emotional connection with the viewer? If not, people go to ‘default,Â’ which is like buying an appliance. The default brand is, obviously, Toyota.Ââ€
When Lutz speaks, crowds gather, and every phrase divulges something special, whether it is within GMÂ’s public-relations parameters, or not. For example, he was asked if the rumored-to-be Chevrolet version of the Acadia might replace the midsize TrailBlazer.
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“The TrailBlazer is somewhat similar in size, but IÂ’m not sure weÂ’re announcing any plans to have a Chevrolet version of the Acadia yet,†said Lutz. “Undeniably, midsize SUVs are rapidly declining, going extinct. Right now, we have the Outlook for Saturn, the Enclave for Buick, along with the Acadia for GMC, and theyÂ’re all different. The trick will be to make the Chevrolet version different againÂ…And from what IÂ’ve seen, it will be radically different.Ââ€
So much for not making the announcement.
John Larson, the youthful-looking GMC-Pontiac-Buick general manager, sat back and smiled at the Lutz presentation. It was suggested that being responsible for three brands with impressive new Pontiac Solstice and G6, Buick LaCrosse, Lucerne and now Enclave, and the new Sierra, Envoy and now Acadia for GMC, Larson must have enjoyed the last five years more than his first dozen at GM.
“I donÂ’t know about that,†said Larson, turning pensive. “ItÂ’s been satisfying to see some recent things come together, but for all the successes weÂ’ve had, I canÂ’t help but think about the plants weÂ’ve closed and the people weÂ’ve had to lay off.Ââ€
TheyÂ’d better be careful, or else guys like Lutz and Larson could ruin GMÂ’s image, which has faded from 1970s-era Corvettes and Camaros to a bean-counter-dominated conglomerate that had lost its soul while dwelling on tradition rather than modernization. After driving the Acadia hard through the California mountains, and talking to Lutz and Thomas afterward, it appears that maybe the lost soul has been located, and new and modernized products indicate GM can refocus on its faltering market share.
The feature-filled Acadia, starting in the low-$30,000 range, will help that.
“We see GMC as a complement, not competition, for Chevrolet,†said Larson, who added that he interacts with his counterparts at Chevrolet on a daily basis.
Still, it always has seemed to me that GMC’s motto as “Professional Grade†is a clever way to imply it’s bigger, stronger and more exclusive than competitors, but it more subtly might include Chevy shoppers, even though the GMC and Chevy pickups and SUVs are identical under differing sheet metal.
If I had a major criticism it is that Acadia still feels big for a crossover – big enough to have less of a truck feel than the larger GM SUVs, but more of a truck feel than performance oriented crossover SUVs such as the new Acura MDX, or the Lexus RX350.
Regardless, the Acadia is a breakthrough for GM, and it may become the halo vehicle GMC — the corporationÂ’s second largest division.
Pretty heady stuff, for a trucklet.
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
For those who want to keep up with John Gilbert's view of sports, mainly hockey with a Minnesota slant, click on the following:
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